The United Nations Office at Geneva
Multimedia Newsroom
Fear spreading in Rafah amid reports of imminent Israeli military intervention
Amid reports that some Palestinians have begun to leave Rafah ahead of an anticipated Israeli military operation in Gaza’s southernmost city, UN humanitarians on Monday insisted that they had no intention of quitting the vital aid hub.
“There was really a lot of hope over the last days that there would be a ceasefire. So, we're genuinely devastated to wake up today and have the reality that is the leaflet drop and you know, reports of evacuations beginning,” said Louise Wateridge, spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.
In an alert on X on Monday, UNRWA warned that an Israeli offensive in Rafah would mean more civilian suffering and deaths. “The consequences would be devastating for 1.4 million people,” the UN agency said, before insisting that it is “not evacuating: the agency will maintain a presence in Rafah as long as possible and will continue providing lifesaving aid to people.”
Speaking from Rafah on Monday morning to UN News, Ms. Wateridge insisted that there was “nowhere to go” for Gazans in the Strip’s southernmost city. Panic is taking hold too, she noted:
“Nobody has a clear path where to go, there is no advice on where to go, there is no safety to be led to. So, in each circumstance, in each family now it's a lot of panic and a lot of chaos, because even though we're hearing the evacuation orders are confined to a small area in Rafah, middle east of Rafah, you can imagine as people start to move, the panic is going to spread. Already outside the window here we're in more central Rafah, people are beginning to take down shelters and leave.”
According to media reports, leaflet drops by the Israeli military above eastern Rafah advised communities to move to the so-called safe zone of Al Mawasi, to the west of Rafah, by the Mediterranean Sea.
UN humanitarians have previously rejected similar evacuation initiatives by the Israeli military on the grounds that they represent forced displacement. “Al Mawasi is quite a concentrated area already and doesn't have the infrastructure in place to be hosting thousands and thousands more displaced people,” Ms. Wateridge said. “So it's not really an option if and when people move or decide to move to that area, there's not a lot waiting there for them.”
More than 400,000 people already shelter in the coastal location, according to the UN agency’s latest assessment, which reported an influx of displaced persons from nearby city of Khan Younis. To help them, UNRWA has two temporary health centres in Al Mawasi, along with other newly established medical points in the area.
“Unlike claims (to the contrary), it is far from safe, because nowhere is safe in Gaza,” insisted UNRWA Communications Director Juliette Touma, on Monday.
Echoing the UNRWA alert, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) also warned that a military siege and incursion in Rafah “would pose catastrophic risks to the 600,000 children” sheltering there.
Many “are highly vulnerable and at the edge of survival”, the UN agency said in a statement, highlighting increased violence in Rafah and the fact that potential evacuation corridors were “likely mined or littered with unexploded ordnance”.
Any military move on Rafah will likely result in very high civilian casualties while also destroying “the few remaining basic services and infrastructure” that people need to survive, UNICEF maintained.
“Hundreds of thousands of children who are now cramped into Rafah are injured, sick, malnourished, traumatized, or living with disabilities,” said UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell. “Many have been displaced multiple times, and have lost homes, parents and loved ones. They need to be protected along with the remaining services that they rely on, including medical facilities and shelter.”
In a related development, the head of the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said that northern Gaza is now experiencing “full-blown famine…and it’s moving its way south”.
Cindy McCain’s remarks on Sunday echoed serious and repeated concerns from other senior UN officials and the international community about aid restrictions and delays imposed by Israeli authorities.
Although more commercial food is reportedly available on the market in around Jabalia city in northern Gaza, UNRWA’s Ms. Wateridge insisted that “outside of that, there are pockets and areas in north Gaza where even the United Nations have not been able to reach, other humanitarian agencies have not been able to reach, and the situation for people there is just devastating”.
Rocket attacks on Kerem Shalom crossing at the weekend reportedly killed three Israeli soldiers, leading to its closure. It would be a massive blow for the humanitarian operation if the same thing happened to Rafah, Ms. Wateridge insisted: “The Rafah border crossing is the biggest and really only feasible place that we have been getting aid in. So, if military operations happen here at the border that is going to impact our ability to bring in aid, to bring in supplies.”
Since 7 October when Hamas-led terror attacks on southern Israel prompted massive Israeli bombardment and a ground offensive, at least 34,680 Palestinians have been killed – including over 14,000 children - and over 78,000 wounded, according to the Gazan health authorities. Some 1,250 people were killed in southern Israeli communities and more than 250 were taken hostage.
ends
STORY: Gaza humanitarian update – UNRWA
TRT: 3’10”
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9 / 9:16
DATELINE: 6 May 2024 Rafah, Gaza
SHOTLIST
- Exterior med shot: UN flag alley
2. SOUNDBITE (English) - Louise Wateridge, spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, from Rafah: “There was really a lot of hope over the last days that there would be a ceasefire. So we're genuinely devastated to wake up today and have the reality that is the leaflet drop and you know, reports of evacuations beginning.”
3. Wide, tented stalls and shelters in Rafah, bare earth, puddles.
4. SOUNDBITE (English) - Louise Wateridge, spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, from Rafah: “There's nowhere to go. Nobody has a clear path where to go, there is no advice on where to go, there is no safety to be led to. So, in each circumstance, in each family now it's a lot of panic and a lot of chaos, because even though we're hearing the evacuation orders are confined to a small area in Rafah, middle east of Rafah, you can imagine as people start to move, the panic is going to spread. Already outside the window here we're in more central Rafah, people are beginning to take down shelters and leave.”
5. Wide (vertical): young children walking towards tented shelters with rubbish scattered widely down a sandy bank.
6. Louise Wateridge, spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, from Rafah: “Al Mawasi is quite a concentrated area already and doesn't have the infrastructure in place to be, you know, hosting thousands and thousands more displaced people. So it's not really an option if and when people move or decide to move to that area, there's not a lot waiting there for them.”
7. Wide (vertical): a lot of rubbish and waste left in a sandy hollow next to tented shelters.
8. Louise Wateridge, spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, from Rafah: “The Rafah border crossing is the biggest and really only feasible place that we have been getting aid in. So, if military operations happen here at the border that is going to impact our ability to bring in aid, to bring in supplies.”
9. Wide (vertical): children stoking a small outdoor oven in front of tented shelters.
10. Louise Wateridge, spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, from Rafah: “There's been more commercial food on the market in around Jabalia which is really promising to see. But of course, there are pockets away from Jabalia; Jabalia is one place, it’s one city where you know the commercial market is more open, but outside of that there are pockets and areas in north Gaza where even the United Nations have not been able to reach, other humanitarian agencies have not been able to reach, and the situation for people there is just devastating.”
11. Wide (vertical): an earth road with puddles and people walking, tented shelters either side.
12. Medium (vertical): a boy walks in front of the camera, barefoot.
13. Wide (vertical): a man cycles through a large puddle covering a road with people massed to rear.
Wide (vertical
Similar Stories
1
1
1
Edited News | UNHCR , WHO , UNMAS
Urgent help is needed to halt a deadly cholera outbreak that is sweeping across Sudan, UN agencies said on Friday, while warning that communities continue to be terrorized by parties to the conflict even as they flee violence.
2
2
1
2
Press Conferences , Edited News , Images | UNEP
Negotiations got under way at UN Geneva on Tuesday to agree on a legally binding treaty to curb plastic pollution, with delegates from nearly 180 countries attending.
1
1
1
Edited News | OCHA , UNICEF
Gaza: Hundreds of trucks per day of free aid needed “for months”, in addition to commercial supplies - OCHA
Despite the tactical pauses Israel introduced last week to allow some safe passage for humanitarian convoys, the amount of aid that has entered Gaza remains by far insufficient for the starving population, and UN trucks continue to face impediments on their way to delivering aid.
1
1
1
Edited News | UN WOMEN
Aid agencies echoed wider warnings of growing signs of widespread starvation in Gaza on Tuesday, as UN-partnered international food security experts released their most dire assessment yet of the situation in the wartorn enclave.
1
1
1
Edited News | IOM , UNDP , UNHCR
Sudan: urgent help needed as more than 1.3 million war-displaced people begin to return home
As conflict rages on across parts of Sudan, pockets of relative safety have emerged in the past four month, spurring more than one million internally displaced Sudanese to make their way home, says the International Organization for Migration (IOM). A further 320,000 cross-border refugees have come back to Sudan since last year, mainly from Egypt and South Sudan, to assess the current situation before deciding to return to their country for good.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNRWA , WHO
Gaza: SOS messages describe people fainting from hunger; UN health worker detained
Worrying alerts from United Nations staff in Gaza who have been fainting from hunger and exhaustion over the past 48 hours have increased fears for people’s survival in the devastated enclave, UN humanitarians said on Tuesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNHCR , UNOG
Over 11.6 million refugees risk losing aid access due to funding cuts, says UNHCR
Approximately one in three refugees and other vulnerable individuals normally supported by the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) are expected to lose out from funding cuts, it said on Friday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, made the following announcement on the Office’s opening of a new mission in Bangladesh.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
“The surge in the number of Afghans forced or compelled to return to Afghanistan this year is creating a multi-layered human rights crisis requiring the urgent attention of the international community,” UN Human Rights spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani said on Friday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk on Friday called for accountability and justice for the killings and other gross human rights violations and abuses in the southern city of Suweida.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNHCR
Syria: hundreds killed in Sweida, ‘widespread’ violations as civilians flee for their lives
Amid violent clashes in southern Syria’s Sweida governorate, a picture of grave human rights abuses and rising humanitarian needs is emerging by the hour, the UN said on Friday.
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
At the bi-weekly press briefing in Geneva the UN Human Rights Spokesperson Liz Throssell made the following statement on the latest number of civilian casualties in Ukraine.